


What Happens Next Will Shock You

by abadmeanman



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: DJWifi, F/M, HarmonicaCave, Mlsecretsanta 2k16, animan - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-11 23:55:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9045017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abadmeanman/pseuds/abadmeanman
Summary: After Chat Noir and Ladybug defeated Animan, Nino and Alya start to feel some attraction building, and go to their best friends for advice. Neither of their besties are particularly good at it... but hey, how badly could a first date go?





	

**Author's Note:**

> My secret Santa gift for HarmonicaCave.tumblr.com! Enjoy!
> 
> This got to be SO much fun to write that there might be some more chapters eventually!

Nino sighed and closed his locker, only to reveal a golden ray of boyshine leaning up against the next one over. Adrien appeared to be doing his sneak-behind-the-locker-surprise-you-when-you-close-it thing again; he'd perfected it on Marinette. Blinking in surprise, Nino pondered why he might be skulking this time. Some more questions about Ladybug and Chat Noir, maybe? Nino  _ had  _ been at Animan ground zero, after all. That made sense. Everyone knew that superhero questions were poppin’ as soon as Adrien was sneaking around the lockers. Just ask Marinette. 

After briefly flailing around in surprise, Nino composed himself enough to process what Adrien had said: 

“Nino! So you and Alya, huh?”

Nino shook his head and adjusted his hat, squaring it up on his head from his flailing-induced disarray. A man must sport it proper, after all. “Uh,” he said, to clarify.

“I heard that you and Alya had kind of a connection, during the Animan attack, I mean.”

“Oh!” said Nino, piecing it together. He’d been somewhat of a mess after an afternoon of panther-cage isolation, an evening of cookies, and a night of Alya-related dreams. Even though Adrien had brought up the thing he was thinking about _literally all the time_ _right now_ , it took him an embarrassing number of moments to sort it all out. “Uh, yeah, we… yeah.”

Wait a minute…

“Uh… bro? Who told you? That was, like, yesterday…”

“Oh! Um,” said Adrien, hand on the back of his neck again, locker-ambush confidence gone. “Alya may have… sorta… grilled me about some stuff.”

“Bro! Did you say good stuff about me?”

“Of course, Nino! You’re my best friend, you’re great! I definitely didn't panic when she grabbed me by the shirt and demanded to know if you were an okay dude!”

Nino smiled and punched Adrien lightly in the shoulder. That sounded like Alya, alright. Straightforward. Driven. Passionate. Startlingly powerful. “‘Ppreciate it, man. Alya’s… yeah she’s real cool.”

“Yeah she is. So…” he asked, voicing the inevitable question. “... I guess you’re over Marinette now?”

“Yeah dude, uh, I guess my crush on Marinette kinda… uh, moved to the side.” Nino held up his hands, head ducking under his bill slightly. “Not that Marinette isn't great! But, uh… we had a real good talk.”

“Well that’s good. And true!” said Adrien.  _ Nice _ , he also thought. “Alya’s great! You should totally go out with her.”

“... Maybe not to the zoo.”

“Maaaaybe not the zoo.”

* * *

“MARINETTE GIRL YOU GOTTA HELP ME.” Alya charged up the stairs to Marinette’s room, proper etiquette for accessing the Dupain-Cheng house long since forgotten. Doors and locks were hilariously irrelevant to Paris’ prime besties. Her friend squawked, flinging her hands into the air briefly before slamming the lid of her magic-snappy-shutty-trappy box down, closing it over a completely irrelevant red blob with black spots and blue eyes which merited absolutely no further attention or investigation. 

Alya flailed her hands in an inadvertent parody of Marinette’s all-too-common romance-reactions to Adrien, crossed the room directly to the chaise longue, and collapsed onto it, dramatically. It was as awkward and ungainly as she’d been in ages. She sighed, distraught, and draped one arm across her eyes.  _ How dare you do this to me, hormones. How dare you do this to me, boys. Boy. _

“Um…” said Marinette, and Alya pulled her arm away from her face to find her bepigtailed friend staring at her upside down, a look of concern stitched across her features as she bent over the chaise to inspect her flustered friend. “Are… is everything okay?” her earlier surprise and startlement was gone--replaced by tense level of concern. 

“Ugh, BABE,” said Alya, which was almost an answer. “Girrrrrllll…” She replaced her arm over her eyes. 

“What is it? Alya! What!” She tried to pry Alya’s arm away, but couldn’t dislodge her friend’s highly dramatic pose, even from her higher vantage point. “Alya!”

“I think Nino is going to ask me out.”

Marinette’s fingers squeezed into Alya’s arm, a warm gasp escaping her as she began lightly vibrating. Two of Alya’s fingernails rattled gently together from Marinette’s buzzing. “Ah! Alya! That’s so great! Wait--” she paused, vibration stopping. “Do you--are you planning to say yes?”

“I am! That’s the problem!” Alya evaded Marinette’s grip, flipping over to mumble directly into the cushions of the chaise. “Ugh!”

“Uh, wrong?” said Marinette. “You’re so wrong?” It was a statement, phrased like a question. To soften the blow. The blow of how completely wrong Alya was. “You like boys. Boys asking you out is a  _ good _ thing, Alya, remember?”

A low moan answered her.

“Uh look all I’m saying is that that’s a problem  _ I’d _ like to have.”

Alya popped her head up, suddenly face-to-face with a slightly-too-close Marinette once again. “Uh, Marinette, you’d only like it if it was _Adrien_ , remember? The last boy who asked you out was Nathanael, and he wasn’t exactly _not an akuma_ _victim_ at the time, you know?”

“Well…” replied Marinette, which was the best response for when you get totally shut down by accurate logic. She drew back slightly, shrugging uncomfortably, before snapping her attention back to Alya, hands on both the reclining girls’ shoulders. “But Nino’s not an akuma! Totally just regular boy! No butterflies! He doesn’t even do the bubble thing anymore. Totally fine.”

“I kinda liked the bubbles,” sulked Alya into the cushions again. 

“We all liked the bubbles,” said Marinette. “It was pretty cute.” 

“It was so cute, Marinette! So cute! Boys don’t do enough cute stuff like that!”

“There, there,” she said, kneeling by the chaise and propping one arm up on the padded pink backboard. Her other hand gently stroked Alya’s hair, doing her best at being the one  _ doing _ the soothing, instead of receiving it. “What’s really the matter?”

“Ugh, this was  _ not _ on my radar!” Alya flipped over again, leaning up against the headboard and allowing Marinette to continue patting her. “I can’t be dating a boy right now! I’d run out on dates all the time! The Ladyblog has to take priority, Marinette, it  _ has  _ to.”

Behind her, Marinette gave a little smile. “The Ladyblog is great, Alya, but Nino knows about it. I’m sure he’ll understand! I mean, no Paris boy asks out the runner of the preeminent Ladybug blog without knowing what they’re getting into, right?”

“... Right…”

“And you can always give him a rain check if there’s an attack. An akuma check!” she said. Then she continued, under her breath: “Or maybe he’ll convince you to seek some damn shelter for once…”

“What?”

“Nothing! Nothing. Nino’s great!”

“Ugh I know!”

“So what’s  _ actually _ the problem?”

Alya was silent for a moment. Marinette paused in her hair stroking, worried that she’d pushed a little  _ too _ far for her friend, but then Alya’s hand came up to her own and returned it to its patting pattern.  _ Okay, good _ , she thought.  _ If she accepts the friendship pats, then all is well. _

“I’m not… okay. Okay, just don’t tell him alright?”

“Of course not!”

“This doesn’t leave the room?”

“Never.”

“Never. Okay.” Alya took a deep breath, letting out slowly through her nose as she rubbed the corners of her eyes with her thumbs. “So you remember Animan, right?”

“Um, all those animals running around? A giraffe ate one of my plants.”  _ Of course, I wasn’t exactly there to watch it…  _ “Yeah, I remember.”

“So Ladybug throwing me and Nino into the panther exhibit kinda… started this all.” Alya curled herself into a small flannel ball, amber eyes peeping out at Marinette. 

“Yeah…” 

Alya sighed, building herself up.  _ Goddammit I cannot let Adrien know about this. His weaboo ass will never let me forget it,  _ thought Alya. “So…”

“Take your time, Alya, it’s okay.”

“Remember how I said I think of him like a brother?”

“Oh! Right! Right when Nino said he--”

“Well now he’s gonna ask me out and I said I think of him like a brother it is makING ME FEEL REALLY WEIRD.” Alya’s voice climbed steadily in volume, in inverse proportion to how compressed her curled-into-a-ballness had advanced. By the time she reached the end of her sentence, she felt approximately the size of a macaron. 

Marinette stifled a giggle, trying to treat Alya’s confession as seriously as Alya was. “Do… you still think of him like a brother?”

“NO, THAT IS WHAT’S WEIRD.”

A tiny snert of laughter escaped Marinette. Alya whirled, turning to see her friend clap both hands over her mouth. 

“Marinette!”

Alya’s incredulous, offended tone was the pun that finally kicked Chat Noir off the Eiffel Tower. Marinette burst out laughing, rolling backwards and flopping helplessly onto the floor. Her friend’s overreaction to an essentially harmless idiom was simply  _ too much _ . She cracked her eyes--blurry with tears of laughter--and saw Alya gaping at her from the headboard of the chaise, still comically distraught. 

“Okay, Alya,” said Marinette. “Your secret is safe with me.”

“Oh,  _ laugh harder when you say that _ , why don’t you!”

“Alya, you’re being ridiculous!” replied Marinette, between guffaws. “It’s--he’s not--it doesn’t matter! Your dumb turn of phrase doesn’t make you a secret incest freak!”

“OKAY, NOT HELPING!”

“But I guess this explains why you were so interested in Greek mythology…”

“Okay  _ that is worse _ !” 

“Hey,” said Marinette, recovering her breath and climbing back up the chaise. “Come on. You’ll be fine. It’ll be fine. You’re great. Nino’s great.”

“Thanks, babe,” replied Alya, bonking her forehead against Marinette’s, before drooping down onto the headboard again. Marinette laid her chin on top of Alya’s head. 

They rested like that for a while. Eventually, Alya reached around the chaise and poked Marinette in the ribs.    
  


“So hey, girl, I know you’re not on this side of things, like, ever, but… how should I prepare?”

* * *

“Um, Marinette? I don’t know if I can get this much information about his schedule.”

“Oh yeah? Huh. Well you can at least get his vitals and email addresses right.”

“Uh…”

“At least listen to the music he made, right?”

“Oh… okay, that’s actually pretty good advice.”

“How many pictures of him do you have? Have you picked out an area to put your shrine?”

“... girl we gotta talk about moderation.”

“I’m moderate! I can be moderate!”

“...Just not with Adrien.”

“Well duh, why  _ would _ I be?”

Alya shook her head, sitting upright on the chaise as Marinette paced back and forth around the room. Deep in thought. For her! It was really quite nice to be on  _ this _ side of the potential romance crisis, for once.

“Honestly, Alya, you’re not giving me a lot to work with here.” Marinette stopped her pacing and blew a puff of air up her face, wiggling her bangs. “Maybe you could steal his phone?”

“What?”

“Yeah! Like you do something embarrassing in a voice mail, and then you have to steal the phone back!”

“No, Marinette, I knew exactly what you meant, it’s just…” Alya crossed her arms, furrowing her brow in thought. “How to put this…” She bit her lower lip and came to a concusion. “Okay, how about this. When you do that, it never works at all?”

“What? It totally works!”

…

“Okay it never works. You’re right.” Marinette slumped into her rolly chair, propping her chin on her elbows on her knees and pouting. “I’m just not very good at the romance advice.”

“Hey, that’s not true!” 

“What about when I told Kim to go for it for Valentine’s Day, and he asked out Chloe?”

“Okay look, that is on Kim, not on you.”

“Hmmmph,” agreed Marinette. One couldn’t hold Chloe’s awfulness against some potentially okay advice. “Maybe.”

“At least it’s kind of nice being on the receiving end of advice, you know?” said Alya. “Normally I’m the one coaching you through the tenderest little interaction with Adrien.”

“And I love you for that!”

“Aw thanks, boo.” 

“Ugh,” said Marinette. “Not to bring it right back to Adrien, but… I bet he’s giving Nino some  _ way _ better advice right now.”

* * *

“How do you get a girl to like you, dude? I’ve never really asked a girl out before!” Nino was draped face-down across the back of Adrien’s sofa, addressing the tiles of the floor. For his part, Adrien was upstairs in his library, trying to sneak a few peeks at some shoujo manga for advice. Nino had noticed him sneaking up the rock-climbing wall a few minutes ago, but decided to pretend he hadn’t seen anything. And now the rhythmic sound of Adrien flipping tankobon pages serenaded Nino. 

“Well… how many puns do you know?” Flip, flip, flip.  _ Apparently _ , thought Nino, _ there aren’t many good tips in Ultimate Pretty Koala Princess. Wait… puns? _

“Uh…” said Nino. “Puns?”

“Uh…” 

“Wait…” Nino righted himself, crossing his arms on the back of the sofa and tipping his hat back to look up at Adrien. Adrien, meanwhile, hid a manga behind his back and whistled nonchalantly, in potentially the most transparent deception in Paris. “Wait, is a pun something you can know? Shouldn’t it just like, show up naturally in the conversation?”

“...damn.” Adrien visibly deflated. “Maybe… How about being constantly over-the-top and flirty? Ladies like that, right?”

“Dude?”

“Yeah dude?”

“I don’t think any woman in the history of the world has ever liked that?”

“What? Really?” Unnoticed, the manga slipped from Adrien’s hand, and he glanced askance at a stack of manga he had previously discarded. “Damn. Damn!”

“Are--hey, you okay, bro?”

“Ha ha! Yeah! Nothing!”

“Has, like, being really flirty ever worked for you? That’s like, not something I’ve seen you do, ya know?”

“JUST SOMETHING I READ ABOUT NO NEED TO THINK ABOUT THAT ANY MORE,” replied Adrien, calmly. Nino, of course, wasn’t listening, wrapped up in his own personal world of potential-asking-out.

“Like do I have a soundtrack? Do I put on some tunes? Should I dress up to ask her out? Is that a thing?”

Adrien leaned over the rail, giving Nino a look of perplexity. “I’ll level with you, here, Nino. I have no idea.”

“But you’re like a super sexy model!”

“Thanks! I guess?”

“You have to know dating stuff! You gotta teach us lowly public schoolers!”

“Bud,” said Adrien, sliding along the rail to his stripper/firefighter pole. He wrapped his legs around it and vogue’d his way down. “I was homeschooled. There wasn’t anyone to  _ date _ ! Except Chloe, and that would have been  _ too weird _ .” 

“Agreedo.”

Nino sighed and collapsed fully back onto the sofa, reclining like a midcentury psychiatry patient. He was a bundle of nerves, beating out a steady, but decidedly  _ not _ ill, rhythm of panic and awkwardness. With one hand, he flipped the bill of his cap over his eyes. Shut the world out, just a bit--that always helps. A little time to block out some senses and then…

Hey, here’s an idea.

“Should I get some superpowers? Do you think that helps? Ladies like superpowers. I bet Chat Noir gets all the ladies.”

Adrien, who was inexplicably taking a sip of water, spluttered all over himself. He went back for seconds, when Nino said:

“Ladybug, too.”

Spluttering his face off for the second time in as many seconds, Adrien found himself hacking up the better part of a fancy bottle of mineral water into his bathroom sink. 

“I dunno, man, what do you think? You get people asking you out all the time, right? What works?”

“I mean, so far, nothing.”

“Dude, really?” Nino sat up. “You’re not a secret lothario on the side?”

“No, I’m no Lady’s bug. Man. Lady’s man. I can’t even get Nathalie to cut me a break. Also, ‘lothario’ is a real good word, by the way.”

“Thanks. Also, dang.”

“You know what, though?” said Adrien. “I think I know someone who could help you out.”

* * *

“I can’t believe you’re actually calling Adrien.” Alya was dangling her arms off the side of Marinette’s bed, staring at her. “This… this is major.”

“Shh! Alya!” Marinette flapped her free hand in panic. “Support me!”

Alya popped up two thumbs and scooted back on the bed, until only her eyes were peeking over the edge. And her double thumbs-up, of course. Support, but withdrawal. 

“A-A-A-Adrien! Hi! Hello!

“HA HA HA HA HYEAH GOOD TO TALK TO YOU TOO! 

“REALLY!??!

Alya gestured frantically for an update, flailing her arms in pleading circles. Marinette grabbed a pen and scribbled on her desk  _ HE WAS ABOUT TO CALL ME!  _ She’d underlined “call me” three times. Alya gave her a wide, open-mouthed grin, and a two thumbs up, then brought her foot over the edge of the bed to add it as an honorary third thumb up. But Marinette was already distracted, continuing her conversation with Adrien.

“Oh gosh wow I’m actually hanging out with Alya right now! Isn’t that something!”

Alya bit into Marinette’s sheets. Number one, Marinette was doing  _ surprisingly _ great. Number two,  _ Adrien  _ could definitely help. It was time for a BFF swap. Temporary, of course.

“So, uh, I was wondering…”

Normally, Alya would be crossing her fingers that Marinette would  _ finally _ be asking Adrien out. But now, somehow, she was the nervous one. 

“Could I, maybe, ask you to meet up with Alya? She… has a couple questions for you.

“What?

“Of course! I’d be happy to talk to Nino, too! What about?

“Oh?

_ ‘Oh _ ?’ thought Alya.  _ What’s this ‘oh’ business? _

“Ohhhhhh… 

Alya frantically gestured for more information. None was forthcoming, yet. 

“No problem at all. W-we can meet at the park to, uh, swap friends. S-sound good?

_!!!, _ thought Alya, doing her best impression of a Final Fantasy conversation

“Great! Th-thanks, Adrien!”

Alya trotted down the stairs to Marinette, sweeping her up into a powerful hug. 

“Babe! Girl! My girl! Aaaa! Awesome!”

“I’m sorry Alya! I have to best-friend cheat on you with Nino! It’s for a good cause!”

“I know girl! I trust you! I trust you to get my back  _ way _ more than you get your own.”

“What’s that supposed to mean!?”

Alya stuck her tongue out at Marinette, the effect somewhat diminished by the fact that she was still embracing her friend, and thus not exactly face-to-face. She emphasized her gesture by blowing a raspberry. 

“The time you manage to call Adrien and actually  _ talk  _ to him, and you’re doing it for  _ me _ ! Girl, I’m flattered!”

“Of course, Alya!  _ Sœurs _ before sirs!”

“Right!”

“Nino’s a great dude.” 

“He really is.” 

“You’re gonna be a lucky lady! He’s everyones bro.” 

“Yeah!” 

“Especially yours!” 

“Okay I’m going to beat you up. Now go trade me for a Nino and  _ get juicy details _ .”

* * *

At Alya’s insistence, they had all dressed in trenchcoats for their meetup in the park. Ostensibly, it was to maintain the nominal secrecy of the swap and make everyone feel like they were being secret spies. It was a good laugh, and also the only acceptable reason to wear a fedora. But Alya had really insisted on the charade to keep Marinette focused on the task at hand, and not on swooning over Adrien. For the moment: success.

Alya found herself sitting across from Adrien at a little coffee shop near the park, feeling like a suburban dad with some hamburgers: she was gonna be  _ grillin’ _ . 

“Okay, Adrien,” she started. “I need some juice on Nino. Anything juicy. Tell me boyfacts.”

“Uh,” said Adrien. “Nino was my first friend who wasn’t Chloe. He’s great! He’s like a brother!”

“AVOID BROTHER TALK,” said Alya, at a reasonable volume that blew Adrien’s hair back. “Sorry. Long story which I won’t share. But like… confidentially… is there any news about a certain……. asking out? That you might know of?”

Adrien sighed and adjusted his hair back into its normal setup. Alya could get quite some volume on her, and in this moment, definitely wanted to avoid sibling mentions. “Look, Alya, you and Nino are gonna go on a date and it’s going to be fine!”

Alya leaned back in her chair and sighed back at Adrien. “I know. I’m just… nervous. Which is dumb! I embarrass myself on the Ladyblog way too often to be embarrassed.”

“Hey,” said Adrien, pushing a biscotti over to her. “It’s different. I model in front of people, all the time, and I’m good at it. But I still didn’t know how roll call worked until Nino told me, my first day. It’s context, you know?”

Alya smiled. Watching Adrien flail helplessly on his first day had been a fun treat for everyone. And he had a good point. 

“Okay, sunflower. Good point. But you’re still gonna tell me stuff about Nino, got it?”

“Whatever you want to know, ma’am.”

* * *

“So, uh, h-hey, Marinette,” said Nino. “Uh, do you think, like… Alya might like me?” He could feel his heart pounding in his chest, obnoxiously desynced from the beat of the music from his headphones. Even if they weren’t on him, he liked leaving them on for a little ambiance. Was it too much to ask that his tunes keep time with his pulse? Come on. 

“Yeah! Totally! You should totally ask her out, Nino!”

“So like… what’s she like?”

“Well, if there’s not an akuma attack…”

“I kinda hope there isn’t…”

“Superheroes, journalism, and cooking! The three cornerstones of Alya.”

Nino produced a small notebook from under his hat. He scribbled down the three cornerstones, underlining each one. “Okay, nice! Do you know what kind of music she likes? What else can you tell me?”

* * *

_ How does Adrien even do this _ , thought Nino, peeking around the row of lockers and waiting for Marinette to give him the signal. She and Alya had just come from class, and Nino was going to sneak behind her locker door, once it was open, intending to surprise her with an on-the-spot asking-out. In a good way, he hoped. The only thing that remained was the timing. And the sneaking.  _ How the _ heck _ does he sneak around so well? _

At long last, Alya cracked the door of her locker, throwing it open and swapping out her books. Marinette kept talking to her, but frantically flapped her hand to the side.  _ The signal. That was definitely the signal _ . 

Nino crept along the lockers, back pressed against them, feeling the bump of the ventilation slits and handles slide against his shoulders as he tried to get in position in time. The locker door was still open. Nailed it. 

He leaned back against the locker, casual, hat tilted up, arms crossed.  _ Too casual? Maybe. Change it up. _

He leaned one arm against the lockers, cocking the other one onto his hip, adjusting his hat to ride low over his eyes. Sultry. Mysterious.  _ Romantic.  _

… That wasn’t going to work, either. 

He flipped around, back to Alya’s locker door.  _ Play it cool, pretend it’s accidental, ‘oh hey Alya didn’t see you there, hey here’s a thought, how bout you and me…’  _ Perfect. 

Nope, not perfect, that was stupid. Dammit!

Nino switched positions a few more times, all of Marinette’s advice on what Alya liked going  _ completely _ out of his gourd as he tried to maximize Nino-sexiness. He was just in the middle of doing some incidental headstand yoga against the lockers, to show off his culturedness and flexibility, which women love, when Alya’s locker slammed closed.

Both Nino and Alya blurred into motion in the same moment, Nino leaping back to his feet in a flash, and Alya jabbing him in the gut with a hefty World History book and a startled “Yeeaaaagh!” 

“Bppphhft,” said Nino, the air knocked out of him. 

“Nino! Oh!” said Alya, dropping her book onto his toes, and earning another muffled “hrrrk.” “I’m so sorry! Are you okay?” She propped him back up with her hands on his shoulders, bracing him against the lockers.

“Hhhbbbhub hubbbb hmmmnt,” said Nino, in a voice made quiet by the fact that there was no air in his lungs, at the moment. Also, his toes hurt. “Hmmmth mmmmmmh?”

“Um,” said Alya, blinking rapidly. “Sorry?”

“Hhhhheehhn mmuhhhhn date sometime?” He was getting his breath back--enough to get some key words across, but not necessarily enough to provide context. 

“I’m so sorry Nino, just take your time.”

“Do you--” huff, huff “--want to go on a date sometime?” 

Alya’s eyes melted into a smile under the otherwise-concerned tightness of her expression. “After beating you up on accident? You’re so gracious in defeat, Lahiffe. Friday?”

“Friday,” agreed Nino, before lightly passing out.

* * *

He hadn’t really had a great experience  _ asking _ Alya out, all told. But actually  _ being _ out was pretty much okay. They’d gotten coffee, chatted, and were checking out the touring exhibit at the Louvre. “The Image of the Journalist and Journalism in Superhero Media: A Retrospective.” Kind of on the nose, when he thought about it. But hey--it hit the right Clarks Kent and the right J.s Jonah Jameson, and it was making for  _ great _ conversation as they walked. Plus, Adrien had scored him a reservation at a place with as many Michelin stars as Alya’s mom, but at which Ms. Cesare had  _ not _ worked. Bonus!

All in all, Nino figured he was doing pretty good at the whole being-on-a-date thing. And the feeling of Alya’s warm little fingers interlacing themselves with his own helped, too.

And because something nice was happening,  _ of course _ an akuma shows up.

They were hand-in-hand halfway to  _ The Ill Papa _ , Paris’ most hip and exclusive Italian restaurant (in which waiters dressed as the Pope served exquisitely prepared potatoes), when swooping spotlights and early-’00’s graphical flourishes shattered the serenity of the evening. Blaring, major-key trumpet scales heralded the most recent of Papillon’s villainous henchmen. 

“They told me I couldn't wear my fursuit on the air! Well, I’ll show them all, now!”

The akuma was gigantic, wearing a dark orange and black suit, and sporting an even more immense television for a head. One of those old CRT one, the kind that definitely tried to exist in all three dimensions at once. Two antennae sprung from the tv, pointing into the air and swiveling around like a mechanical set of ears. He carried a sizable foam-tipped microphone in one hand. On the screen, a scowling, masked Alec Cataldi--the Kidz+ host--hollered over a chorus of Parisians trapped in his live studio audience. Each was begging, shouting for help from behind the talking head. One held a sign that said “HI MOM! I’M ON TV! ALSO HELP!”

“I am RENARD NOUVELLES, and I am bringing YOU….” He paused for dramatic effect, producing a whip from the bulbous end of his mic. It writhed and crackled with a constant stream of stock prices and news updates from around the globe--a whip made from the news ticker, or the news crawl, or whatever that thing is called. As he paused, the swooping graphics and trumpet music built a false sense of drama for what he was about to say. Eventually, he continued: “... BREAKING NEWS!”

Renard Nouvelles cracked his whip, and a shockwave of infographics, sound bites, and man-on-the-street interview clips destroyed the Louvre pyramid. Breaking news, indeed. 

Nino had pretty decent reactions, and so he found himself running for cover, pulling Alya along with him by their interlaced fingers. Her other hand had already pulled out her phone and was livestreaming to the Ladyblog.  _ How the hell did she do that so fast _ ? he thought, before ducking behind a magazine kiosk. 

A newsstand might not have been the wisest choice for cover, given the akuma’s theme, but hey--it was there. 

“Oh my HECK, Nino! This is great! We are  _ right here! _ ” Alya let go of Nino’s hand to better stabilize her phone for the recording, popping her head past the side of the kiosk. “This footage is gonna be so good!”

“BABE,” said Nino, trying to pull her back. “I support you and the Ladyblog, but we are at akuma ground zero, and you can't report if he traps you in his studio audience! Get back!”

“Hell no, DJ Buzzkill! I've never gotten footage this good before!”

“YELLOW JOURNALISM!” shouted Renard Nouvelles, firing a beam of cheap newsprint that colored an entire swath of Paris a bright saffron hue, and started the Spanish-American war back up. 

Alya looked over her shoulder at Nino. “When Ladybug and Chat Noir get here, this is gonna be super intense! Come with me!” Taking charge this time, she grabbed Nino by the arm and dashed after the akuma’s path of destruction, narrating over Nino’s protests all the while. 

“Hello Ladyblog viewers! We have an active akuma near the Louvre, who appears to be a send-people-to-an-alternate-dimension akuma, like Numeric and the Gamer. Ladybug and Chat Noir are not yet on the scene, but the akuma appears to have a journalism theme and--”

“BREAKING NEWS!” A building crumbled into rubble. 

“--There you go, and may be a disgruntled children’s TV host! More as this devel--oops.” The last she said mid-stumble, almost landing flat on her face, or worse, flat on her phone. She scowled at the dumb curve that  _ dared _ impede her, and Nino helped her to her feet. 

“Babe this one seems pretty bad, we should maybe--”

“Nino, I will kiss you so good if you’ll be my cameraman.”

* * *

“I'm having real second thoughts about this, girl!” said Nino, peering around the edge of Alya’s phone, which he was attempting to hide behind. With limited success. 

Alya paid him little to no attention. She had somehow produced a full-sized newscaster microphone with a Ladyblog logo from her person--had it been under her shirt? Where had it come from?--and was rapidly speaking into it as Nino raced to keep up. He hummed a small, soothing beatbox rhythm to himself, doing double duty as a soundtrack to the video he was taking, and helping keep his blood pressure lower than one billion over one million. 

At least Ladybug and Chat Noir had shown up quickly--they'd beaten up on Renard Nouvelles pretty well, interrupting his airing of a  _ decidedly  _ pro-Papillon interview, but they were having less and less luck as time went on. The akuma had clearly infected the microphone, but neither of the heroes had been able to disarm him. Now they faced off at the Trocadero, two superheroes versus one villain, with Alya and Nino recording from behind a hedge. Not even close to safe. 

“News flash, Renard Nouvelles! We've already had one fox akuma who was full of shit and had a sinister agenda! We don't need another!” Ladybug was whirling her yoyo in front of herself, deflecting lash after lash of the villain’s Breaking News whip. One particularly sharp crack sent both her and Chat Noir sliding back a dozen meters. 

The sound left them both shaking their heads to clear the stunning effects of the blast. Chat Noir hopped to his feet first, levering Ladybug off of the ground with his baton. “Now  _ that _ is what I call an investigative  _ report _ , my lady.”

Ladybug didn’t reply, instead snapping her fingers by her ear to check her hearing on that side. 

“See, because an investigative report is a news thing, but a  _ report _ is also like a loud sound, so--”

“No, I got it, Chat.”

“Oh, good, I was pretty proud of that one.”

“Thanks! I was--”

“But can you  _ seriously _ focus for a second here?!”

Before Chat Noir’s ears could droop in abashedness, they were interrupted by the akumatized villain.

“If you think THAT got your attention, then… What Happens Next Will Shock You!”

For a moment, everyone froze. Renard Nouvelles, Ladybug, Chat Noir, Nino--even Alya paused in her play by play. 

…

Some time passed in silence, no clear thing happening after Renard Nouvelles had declared his attack. Ladybug cleared her throat.    
  


“A-hem, you don’t have to do this, you can--”

Blasts of electricity raced across the air from Renard Nouvelles’ antennae-ears, zapping the two heroes and throwing them back. They smoked gently, laying motionless and prone and stunned on the concrete of the pathway. 

“Dude. I can’t believe that pun,” said Nino. “Do you think they're okay?”

“Shh! He's talking to Papillon!” A purple butterfly outline glowed in front of Renard Nouvelles’ face/screen, and the akuma villain had a quiet conversation with his boss. As they spoke, he started walking towards the fallen superheroes. 

“Oh dang, he’s going for their miraculouses!” said Nino, zooming in on the still-still heroes.

“We have to distract him. Nino! Come with me!”

Before Nino could protest--before he could decide whether he was  _ going _ to protest--she vaulted over the hedge and raced towards the akuma villain. 

“Alya! Whoa!” Nino raced after her. 

“Renard Nouvelles! Renard Nouvelles! How do you respond to accusations that your coverage is abjectly biased towards pro-Papillon interests? Do you have any comment on the role of media as entertainment rather than information?”

Nino groaned. This was not, strictly speaking, how he had planned his first date to go. 


End file.
